No its not the new metro Melbourne transit map, Nowandnext.com and Future Exploration Network have collaborated to create a map of major trends for 2007 and beyond, across ten segments: society & culture, government & politics, work & business, media & communications, science & technology, food & drink, medicine & well-being, financial services, retail & leisure, and transport & automotive. Designed like a transit map for a big international city, core ideas and trends are laid out like train stations and transfer hubs. Read more »

We’re back from our break, refreshed and ready to tackle another big year. The time spent disconnected to this matrix was wonderful but we’re happy to be back. Read more »

This is a little left field but hey its Friday and we’re all a little tired of the mouse and monitor. What better way to lighten up the afternoon then with a bit of JENGA? Boring…I hear you cry. Well you haven’t played Jiant JENGA. Read more »

Ok this really is a bit more “advertising” as opposed to below the line marketing but we couldn’t help ourselves when it comes to edgy print ads. It was bought to our attention that an ad created by none other than Oliviereo (I’ll tackle every taboo head on) Toscani in 1991 for Italian Fashion house Bennetton was spotted in all it’s former glory again in Switzerland recently. We believe the intention was to try and poke at the sensitivities around religon and sex.

We love controversy at Accure, in fact we love to push the boundaries every now and then. Nothing excites us more than simple direct messages that picks at the scabs of human sociological interaction. Wonder if the Pope would share our same delight with this ad? I can just imagine the choking saga at breakfast if the Pope had seen this run in the morning paper!

We’ll try and keep you posted as to whether this re-appears in Italy and if so, how long it lasted before it got the arse. We’ll see how long it also takes for some one like Adrants to post something witty on it.

HEY DON”T FREAK OUT, YOU HAVEN’T COME TO THE WRONG SITE, THIS IS STILL CARPARK

You may have noticed a slight change in appearance. We have decided to change the look and feel of the site after much whinging and whining from Donnie. The intention was to make carpark a little less stuffy, don’t know whether this has been achieved though? At least we are utilising more space on the page.

Anyway all the goodness remains the same, we have resisted the compulsive urge to add more and more features that would eventually send us off the end of the Feature Arms Race. Like the message offered in book above (pictured) by Kathryn Cramer and Hank Wasiak, we look to acting on positives and passion rather than fear.

Or you could look at it as a bit of botox to keep us going. Don’t like it? let your voice be heard.

We have officially moved into our new HQ on the west fringe of Ol’ Melbourne town. This creative space will see the next chapter of the Accure story. Coincidentally, 6 Phoenix Lane in West Melbourne has had quite a unique past and with words courtesy of Anne Pavey, here is a little description of our new old building. Read more »

A few of us here at Accure like to keep up to date with whats happening on a global scale in all sorts of matters. It fosters a rich set of ideas from which the group can draw on collectively. Recently though, I have found some slightly confusing messages from the renouned business information portals. Read more »

We have stumbled across a good post on Maple Creative that provides some good pointers on tracking the effectiveness of your marketing.

In essence, this is a simple no nonsense activity that will work for any industry.

Step 1 - Commit to do this.

Step 2 - Every time you hear from a new person, ask them this question: “How did you hear about us?” (Also known as the six most important words in marketing.)

Step 3 - Create a log of the answers you get to this question.

Step 4 - Analyze the trends/patterns and discuss it within your work group.

Step 5 - Do more of the marketing tactics that are showing up on your log as the source of customer inquiries. Stop doing those marketing tactics that are missing from the log.

Repeat forever.

As simple as that! So people - How did you hear about this blog?

No this is not a horse race but a quick note to let our readers and clients know what’s going on in the internet world of late and how some upcoming changes unleasehed by Microsoft may alter the interactve experience of our website and many other creative websites out there. It looks as though even Mr. Godin is having trouble with IE Read more »

IBM has completed a comprehensive white paper titled “The end of TV as we know it: A future perspective”. It’s a very good future gazing exercise and definately worth a read if you have the time. Aside from the obvious, the paper touches briefly on how other things like marketing will also need to change circa 2012 as a result. In brief, one of the recommendations suggest:

“Segment: Invest in divergent strategies and supply chains for bimodal consumer types. Identify, develop and continually refine data-driven user profiles in order to optimize product and service development, distribution, marketing messaging, and service migration. Tailor content, advertising, pricing and reach dynamically”

It all about dynamic experiences…Exciting times ahead for everyone.

Download the entire paper here.